Steviol glycosides (E960): What the Sources Found

Steviol glycosides is the sweetener the food industry lists as E960. In our table it is low risk: it takes 6 of the 33 additive points off a product's score for a child.

In short

Low risk. 6 of the 33 additive points come off a product that carries it.
Flagged for young children. Set only where EFSA’s own exposure assessment shows toddlers or children exceeding or approaching the ADI, or where a regulator used explicitly child-specific language. For a child under 6 it moves one class up.
3 citations from EFSA, FDA, each one below.

What Steviol glycosides does to a score

A packaged food starts with 33 points for what is in its ingredient list. Steviol glycosides takes 6 of the 33 additive points off a product's score, and a child under 6 sees it one class higher again. Scan the pack in Sito and the score you get is the one for your own child's age, with this additive named in the reasons. How we score has the whole method.

What the sources found

Every classification in our table comes from the citations below, and nothing else. They are quoted as the source wrote them.

EFSA Journal 2024;22(11):9045, doi:10.2903/j.efsa.2024.9045 (PMC11533382)
The Panel found insufficient justification to raise the steviol ADI of 4 mg/kg bw/day and concluded that the proposed extension of use and higher maximum permitted levels would result in an INCREASED exceedance of the ADI for TODDLERS at the 95th percentile.
EFSA ANS Panel, revised exposure assessment of steviol glycosides (E 960), EFSA Journal 2014;12(5):3639 (efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/pub/3639); ADI of 4 mg/kg bw/day set in 2010
High-level (95th percentile) exposure exceeded the ADI for toddlers and children in four dietary surveys, with toddler high-consumer estimates around 4.3 mg/kg bw/day against the 4 mg/kg bw/day ADI — the age-group basis for higher-concern-for-young-children flag.
FDA GRAS Notice Inventory (high-purity steviol glycoside notices, e.g. GRN 000619, GRN 000745) and Import Alert 45-06
US status splits: high-purity steviol glycosides (>=95%) are covered by GRAS notices FDA has not objected to, while stevia leaf and crude extracts are not GRAS and are subject to import alert — the US status depends on which form the ingredient list names.

Why this class

A credible adverse or precautionary signal that stops short of every Moderate and High criterion: peer-reviewed adverse findings not yet reflected in regulatory status, an exposure exceedance confined to high-percentile or single-event estimates, or a precautionary regulatory step short of those criteria — a reduced ADI, a data limitation noted without an adverse conclusion, a narrowed or conditioned authorisation, or a child-focused assessment or school-food law that covers the additive as part of a class.

Our confidence in this row's classification is high. Medium or low does not mean the evidence is weak; it means something about the row is still being pinned down, usually a regulatory status confirmed from one source rather than two.